Diversity is just good for business

Diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) programmes and policies are not only the right things for organisations to have in place from a moral and ethical perspective, they are also good for business. That’s the firm belief of Margot Slattery CDir, the Irishwoman who is now Global Head of Diversity, Inclusion, Belonging and Social Sustainability at Danish headquartered world leading facilities management firm ISS.

She is probably better known in Ireland for her 30-year career with Sodexo which included stints as Country Chief Executive and President for Ireland North and South before moving on to become the company’s Global Diversity and Inclusion Officer.

Diversity, equity and inclusion matters

At a fundamental level, she believes DEI matters because companies need to understand the people who work for them. “We work with human beings, not robots,” she says. “We still work with human bots, thankfully. And we are such an interesting lot. We all come with challenges in our lives. We are small, tall, black, white and from many different backgrounds . When we come to work that all manifests itself. If a company wants to succeed and grow it needs to invest in its people and understand what motivates them.”

That positive view of DEI aligns with the results of a recent survey carried out by the Institute of Directors (IoD) Ireland. The survey found that sentiment towards DEI among directors is mostly positive with 88% and 80% saying it has had a positive impact on company-wide culture and on attraction and retention of talent, respectively. Just under 72% of respondents said that there was a positive impact on the organisation’s external reputation.

The multi-generational workforce brings its own complexities, Slattery notes. “We have five generations in the workforce now and younger generations are very clear about what they expect from companies in areas like social justice and so on. They expect to work in a culture of respect and dignity. I’m of a generation where you got a job, kept your head down, and kept it for the rest of your life. People want so much more from work now and companies have no choice but to be engaged with that.” Additionally, with declining birth rates in many parts of the world it’s a business imperative to ensure we recruit from a wider workforce.

The value of DE&I

It's not just a people pleaser, however. “The big value of DEI is that it is a great force for innovation and growth,” she contends. “It contributes to different thinking about how things are manufactured and made. We are not all buying black Model T Fords anymore. A chair is an example. It used to be standard and ordinary. Now we want different types of chairs depending on what we are using them for. And if we have a bad back, we want a different design again. Companies need to take a more inclusive approach to consumer markets.”

She points to hair care products as another example. “Ethnicity can affect choices. That may sound like a small thing to you or me, but it matters a lot to a company like Proctor & Gamble.”

It can also come down to very simple things. “If you are buying a product online and the only gender choices are male and female, that indicates a certain culture. Having an option of ‘prefer not to say’ would at least show there is a recognition that gender is not always a simple binary choice for people. That’s a missed trick for many organisations. By having a diversity of voices in the room you can innovate and change to meet people’s differing needs.”

But simply having the people in the room will not guarantee diversity of thought. “You can put the people in, but you need to set them up for success,” she explains. “Having the right people in the room doesn’t mean that anything changes. People can just be assimilated and become the same as everyone else in the room. You need both the diversity and the psychological safety for people to be challenging. That’s incredibly important. You need to feel safe when you speak up. Look at Ireland, when a lot of bad things were going on years ago and people didn’t speak up that led to even bigger problems. The ability to speak up is very important. Without it, companies lock in problems and risk and store up problems for the future.”

People also need to be actively encouraged to speak. “For example, people in the front line. If they don’t feel comfortable saying something, that’s the day the accident happens. We need to make speaking up normal behaviour but lots of people don’t want to appear argumentative and some of that comes from cultural backgrounds . A good chair or leader will address that.”

Successful strategies for more diverse boards

A vastly experienced independent non-executive director (INED) and Chartered Director, Slattery has served on a number of boards both in Ireland and Europe and is currently a board member of Bord na Mona and BITCI, and chairs the AGDIF advisory board and one of Ireland’s most exciting tech start-ups along with a number of other positions. She has seen at first hand the implementation of successful strategies to create more diverse and inclusive boards.

“The most important thing is that the organisation must want to make a change,” she says. “It starts with the chair and the board and the shareholders. They must want to do it. If you have a chair who wants it and gets it, it will happen. If that isn’t the case, it’s a waste of time. But you can’t just put one person in and expect them to change everything. If you think one person on their own can bring about transformation, you’re kidding yourself. There is comfort in numbers. You need enough representation on the board. Geoff Meagher, the chair of Bord na Mona, really embraced it and over the past five or six years the board has become even more diverse.”

She warns against cosmetic changes. “You have to make sure it is not just box ticking. You can’t just take out two people you don’t like and replace them with two that you do. That is just plain wrong. You need to set out your DEI policies and follow through on them. You need to have to have clear focus, with clear KPIs and follow through to deliver outcomes. Diversity might be around gender, ethnicity, background or other characteristics. You should keep it close to the business and look at what might help to better understand people in your customer base. You should also set out a timeframe and a plan for how you are going to improve board diversity. There are lists of people out there who have put themselves out there to serve on boards and you can use those to improve diversity. There is the public appointments process as well. You can also outsource it to recruitment company or consultancy.”

Looking at the lamentably low number of females in leadership roles in Irish companies, she expresses concern. “I am really surprised that Irish companies are not changing faster. The day of reckoning will come, particularly with consumers coming from Gen Z and Millennials expecting companies to be more inclusive and not in a tick boxy way.”  Balance for Better Business and the 30% club are really pushing this and we have seen the percentage of women on boards improve. We just now need to see the acceleration at executive levels.

But maybe they are not listening: “My father used to say you can bring a horse to water, but you can’t make it drink.”

Evolution, not revolution

She doesn’t hope for overnight change, however. “You have to get the right balance and you need to set a timeframe to get there. It does take time. It’s about evolution, not revolution. As you get one thing right, move on to other things. Also, DEI shouldn’t make people feel uncomfortable. We need to allow people say the wrong things and make mistakes. That’s how we learn. If the intention is good, that’s the important thing.”

Progress might need a little push, however, and she does favour quotas over targets, in the short to medium term at least. “The Madeleine Albright quote sums it up. ‘I don’t like quotas, but I like what they achieve’. Targets are good but they don’t make change happen. We need to start with quotas.”

Of course, there are those who claim that quotas or any form of positive discrimination are unfair to others. She rejects that contention. “Of course, people need help if they start out at a disadvantage. And we all gain from that help. We all benefit from the ramps at the entrances to buildings, for example. It’s not just people with disabilities, people with wheeled suitcases, who don’t like climbing steps, who are tired, use them as well.”

And everyone can do with a little help and support along the way, she adds. “When I was coming through my career in Sodexo, I had a great ambition to lead the company in Ireland. I was very lucky to have a boss who said I had gaps that needed to be filled if I was to do that. He made sure I got the tuition and training to get to the right level and put me in a position to go for the job.”

From a broader international perspective, she counsels caution when it comes to the implementation of DEI policies and programmes in different regions. “What works in one might not work in another,” she points out. “They don’t face the same challenges so you can’t apply the same solutions. You need to understand the geopolitical side of things and what things look like and feel like on the ground. Be true to your values and stick to them but you have to take care. For example, you can’t just support LBGTQI+ rights in the same way as you would in Western Europe in a place where it is illegal to be part of that community. You might put people at risk by being very vocal on those issues and you need to be aware of that.”

Finally, there have been cases of organisations being accused of ‘pinkwashing’ – paying lip service to LGBTQI+ issues but little more. She says this can apply to every aspect of DEI or other progressive policies but believes it is not the major problem some people consider it to be.

“You have to be very careful about what you say you stand for,” she says. “You will be caught out if you don’t live up to it. The organic movement is very good at calling out false organic product claims, for example. People can look at a company’s annual report and the claims made in it. They can then look at the company’s appearances in front of the Labour Court and other forums and see if they match up to the annual report. But we can’t be too judgemental. We should welcome companies that are making progress. It’s about taking time to pause, look at your values and doing two or three things well before moving on to the next things. Don’t try to be all things to all people. That might mean cutting back on the rainbow flags and giving the money to an NGO which might be able to do something more useful with it. That’s a more accountable way of doing it.”